Oldham Riots - Togetherness is key to a better future

The Asian News marked the 10th anniversary of the Oldham riots earlier this year with a series of insightful articles around the disturbances. Happening before 9/11, those disturbances were to transform the way Britain viewed its Muslim communities, and also the way many Muslims viewed themselves.

Ten years on and we have witnessed more widespread civil disturbances, but not in predominantly Muslim areas. In reflecting back, what can we learn today? In order to learn lessons, OBV will be running the full series of articles written by Yakub Qureshi from the Asian News to mark the Oldham Riots - 10 years on.

From the Asian News:

If David Ritchie wanted to ask how people in Oldham felt about their town, all he had to do was walk outside his office.

The man charged with writing one of Britain’s most significant reports into racial segregation in the aftermath of the riots set up his headquarters in the town’s Spindles shopping centre. It was an unusual choice - but proved a surprisingly neutral space in a town split by territorial divisions.

More than 900 visitors from all backgrounds were quizzed about race relations, revealing a worrying degree of ‘self-segregation’ in Pakistani, Bangladeshi, and White communities. Civil servant Mr Ritchie, had decades of experience working with diverse communities in his native Birmingham.

In July, he was invited to chair the Oldham Independent Review - better known as the Ritchie Report - into the root cause of the problem.

He said,

For that period I was there in Oldham at least three or four days a week. The council gave me an office in their building, but we moved out shortly afterwards. We were given a unit in Spindles shopping centre. It was off council premises. We opened up a drop-in centre for people to give their views. It was quite unique - although we did have a structured interview, so the information we got was rigorous. What I was most surprised about was the degree of separation and there was very little integration. The concept of parallel communities was what surprised me. There were quite substantial depths of mistrust. But some things weren’t as bad as were made out. We found the police force wasn’t anything as much to blame as was being suggested.

The need for answers was more pressing than ever. A week after the riots, the BNP polled 6,500 votes – 16 per cent – in Oldham West at the General Election. While commissioned by the local council and other groups, the team showed their independence by refusing to pull punches over what they saw as failures by the Town Hall, and other groups, to act sooner. One of his most damning criticisms was pointing to statistics which showed that out of 11,621 council employees only 2.7 per cent were from ethnic minorities.

He said,

Oldham Council for many years before the riots had been quite content to deal with the Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities through their appointed leaders. A lot of those leaders were, to some extent, out of touch with their own youth. In some sense, these relationships suited the council and the political parties. But it wasn’t a healthy thing in my view. Somehow, some very deep divisions crept up with people unaware.

As well as identifying a lack of shared spaces where Asian and White Oldhamers could meet, the report called for greater educational mixing and a programme for new housing. The 63-year-old, now retired from the civil service, hailed recent moves to merge secondary schools with predominantly White and Asian pupils.

He added,

It is an immensely encouraging thing - I remain convinced that bringing people together at an early stage in their lives is the solution.

OBV is running a series from the Asian News to mark the 10th anniversary of the Oldham Riots.